Oklahoma’s First Model Aviation Town

By Lisa Bradley, Special Collections Librarian

By 1942, city leaders anticipated that Oklahoma City’s population would grow by 50,000 with the addition of two new employers: the Midwest Air Depot and Douglas Aircraft Company. But where would those families live? One man wasn’t concerned. He saw an opportunity long before the Oklahoma City Chamber of Commerce did. That man was W. P. “Bill” Atkinson, a former journalist turned city builder. Atkinson unveiled plans for his model town, the first model town devoted to aviation in Oklahoma—Midwest City.

Construction began on the 168-acre and $4 million new town on March 1, 1942. The plans included 60 rental duplexes and 612 single-family homes to house 2,500 families. These homes would cost between $2,750 and $4,500. Streets were named for aviators and airplanes including Aeronca, Boeing, Curtiss, Lockheed, and Rickenbacker. As an added incentive, prospective home buyers had a new way to buy a home—a loan from the Federal Housing Administration (FHA). These loans, created during the Great Depression, were especially attractive to first-time home buyers as families needed less of a down payment to move into their first home.

Midwest City was planned to be a complete town built on the north side of SE 29th St. for civilian employees of the new Midwest Air Depot and later, the Douglas Aircraft Company. Atkinson’s plan included schools, a retail shopping center, a movie theater and two parks.

In 1943, the first school year for the new town, classes were held in barracks and huts assembled by parents and students. On the first day of September 1944, the students arrived for classes in brand new school buildings: a high school (Midwest City High School) and three grade schools (Midwest City, Sooner and Soldier Creek).

Opening in October 1944, the Skytrain Theatre was the first movie theater in Midwest City, and part of Atkinson’s original plan for Atkinson Plaza located directly across 29th St. from the air base. Even the theater was named for an airplane: Skytrain was a nickname for the C-47 (AKA the Gooney Bird) which was built at the Douglas plant across the street. The theater was owned by R. Lewis Barton and his wife Dollye. Their son, Robert served as a radio operator in Northern Italy during WWII and rejoined his dad in the theatre business at the end of the war.

Although not part of Atkinson’s original plan, by the early 1950s, residents decided the community needed a library. Civic organizations including school PTAs organized book drives and fundraisers. The city responded by designating a city garage at 300 Mid-America as the new library. A 1953 bond issue for “library and jail expansion” passed—the library entrance would be separate from the jail entrance. In March 1955, the first librarian was appointed for the new library—Mrs. Lillian Crumpler. Two thousand library cards were issued in that first year, and 20,591 books were circulated.

In 2001, Midwest City began the process of buying out the businesses and some of the homes in the area to redevelop the land into a new shopping area. Today, the twin water towers, the U-shaped street layout, and the aviation-inspired street names are visible reminders of the area as it was first developed back in 1942.